In addition to directing many of his own star vehicles, Eastwood has also directed films in which he did not appear, such as the mystery drama Mystic River (2003) and the war film Letters from Iwo Jima (2006), for which he received Academy Award nominations, and the drama Changeling (2008). The war drama biopic American Sniper (2014) set box office records for the biggest January release ever and was also the biggest opening ever for an Eastwood film. He received considerable critical praise in France for several films including some which were not well received in the United States. He has been awarded two of France's highest honors: in 1994 he became a recipient of the Commandeur of the Ordre des Arts et des Lettres and in 2007 he was awarded the Légion d'honneur medal. In 2000, he was awarded the Italian Venice Film FestivalGolden Lion for lifetime achievement.

Since 1967, Eastwood has run his own production company, Malpaso, which has produced all except four of his American films. He served as the nonpartisan mayor of Carmel-by-the-Sea, California from 1986 to 1988.

Clinton Eastwood, Jr. was born in San Francisco, California, the son of Clinton Eastwood Sr., a steelworker and migrant worker, and his wife Margaret Ruth (Runner) Eastwood, an IBM factory worker.[4][5] He was nicknamed "Samson" by the hospital nurses because he weighed 11 pounds 6 ounces (5.2 kg) at birth.[6][7] He has a younger sister, Jeanne, born in 1934.[8] His stepfather was lumber magnate John Belden Wood (November 24, 1913 – February 18, 2004).[9] Eastwood is of English, Irish, Scottish, and Dutch ancestry[10] and was raised in a working class environment.[11][12] His family moved often as his father worked at jobs along the West Coast.[13][14] They finally settled in Piedmont, California, where Eastwood attended Piedmont Junior High School.[15] Shortly before he was to enter Piedmont High School, he rode his bike on the school's sports field and tore up the wet turf; this resulted in his being asked not to enroll.[16] Instead, he attended Oakland Technical High School, where the drama teachers encouraged him to take part in school plays. However, Eastwood was not interested. He worked at a number of jobs, including lifeguard, paper carrier, grocery clerk, forest firefighter, and golf caddy.[17]

In 1951, Eastwood enrolled at Seattle University[18] but was then drafted into the United States Army[19] and assigned to Fort Ord in California, where he was appointed as a lifeguard and swimming instructor.[20] In Patrick McGilligan's unauthorized biography Clint: The Life and Legend, high school friend Don Loomis alleged Eastwood avoided being sent to combat in the Korean War by "romancing one of the daughters of a Fort Ord officer, who might have been entreated to watch out for him when names came up for posting".[21][22] While returning from a weekend visit to his parents in Seattle, Washington, he was a passenger on a Douglas AD bomber that ran out of fuel and crashed into the ocean near Point Reyes.[23][24] Escaping from the sinking aircraft, he and the pilot swam 3 miles (5 km) to safety.[25]

According to the CBS press release for Rawhide, Universal Studios (then known as Universal-International) was shooting in Fort Ord when an assistant noticed Eastwood and arranged for him to meet the series' director.[26] According to biographer Richard Schickel, a man named Chuck Hill was instrumental in securing employment for Eastwood at Universal;[26] Hill, who had contacts in Hollywood, managed to sneak Eastwood into one of Universal's studios, where he showed him to cameraman Irving Glassberg.[26] Glassberg arranged for Eastwood to have an audition with Arthur Lubin who, although impressed with Eastwood's appearance and 6-foot-4-inch (1.93 m) frame,[27] initially questioned his acting skills, remarking, "He was quite amateurish. He didn't know which way to turn or which way to go or do anything".[28] Lubin suggested Eastwood attend drama classes, and arranged for his initial contract in April 1954 at $100 (878 in 2015 dollars[29]) per week.[28] After signing, Eastwood was criticized for his stiff manner, his squint, and for hissing his lines through his teeth, a feature that would become a lifelong trademark.[30][31][32][33]

He finally received his break in the role of Rowdy Yates for the CBS hour-long western series Rawhide in the summer of 1958,[41][42] although he was not especially happy with his role. Eastwood, then 28, felt his character Rowdy was too young and cloddish for him to feel comfortable with the part.[43]Rawhide premiered in January 1959[44] and after its release took only three weeks to reach the top 20 in the TV ratings. Although the series never won an Emmy, it was a considerable success for several years, reaching its peak at number six in the ratings between October 1960 and April 1961.[45] The Rawhide years (1959–65) were some of the most grueling of Eastwood's career. He often filmed for six days a week at an average of twelve hours a day, yet some directors still criticized him for not working hard enough.[45][46] By late 1963 Rawhide′s popularity had declined. Lacking freshness in the scripts, it was canceled in the middle of the 1965–66 television season.[47] Eastwood made his first attempt at directing when he filmed several trailers for the show, although he was unable to convince producers to let him direct an episode.[48] In the show's first season Eastwood earned $750 (6,131 in 2015 dollars[29]) an episode. At the time of Rawhide′s cancellation, he received $119,000 (890,552 in 2015 dollars[29]) an episode in compensation.[49] The original series lead Eric Fleming had quit the series by the final season, leaving Eastwood as the top-billed leading man; Eastwood had also appeared in the Italian theatrical movie A Fistful of Dollars by then, filmed during Rawhide's summer hiatus but not yet released in the United States.

In late 1963, Eastwood's co-star on Rawhide, Eric Fleming, rejected an offer to star in an Italian-made western called A Fistful of Dollars, to be directed in a remote region of Spain by the then relatively unknown Sergio Leone.[50] Knowing that he could play a cowboy convincingly, Richard Harrison suggested Eastwood, who in turn saw the film as an opportunity to escape from his Rawhide image. He signed a contract for $15,000 (114,061 in 2015 dollars[29]) in wages for eleven weeks' work, with a bonus of a Mercedes automobile upon completion.[51][52] Eastwood later spoke of the transition from a television western to A Fistful of Dollars: "In Rawhide I did get awfully tired of playing the conventional white hat. The hero who kisses old ladies and dogs and was kind to everybody. I decided it was time to be an anti-hero."[53] Eastwood was instrumental in creating the Man with No Name character's distinctive visual style and, although a non-smoker, Leone insisted Eastwood smoke cigars as an essential ingredient of the "mask" he was attempting to create for the loner character.[54]

Eastwood in A Fistful of Dollars (1964)

A Fistful of Dollars proved a landmark in the development of spaghetti Westerns, with Leone depicting a more lawless and desolate world than traditional westerns, and challenging American stereotypes of a western hero with a morally ambiguous antihero. The film's success made Eastwood a major star in Italy[55] and he was re-hired to star in For a Few Dollars More (1965), the second of the trilogy. Through the efforts of screenwriter Luciano Vincenzoni, the rights to For a Few Dollars More and the final film of the trilogy (The Good, the Bad and the Ugly) were sold to United Artists for about $900,000 (6.74 million in 2015 dollars[29]).[56]

In January 1966, Eastwood met producer Dino De Laurentiis in New York City and agreed to star in a non-Western five-part anthology production named Le Streghe ("The Witches") opposite De Laurentiis' wife, actress Silvana Mangano.[57] Eastwood's nineteen-minute installment took only a few days to shoot, but his performance did not please the critics, one writing that "no other performance of his is quite so 'un-Clintlike' ".[58] Two months later Eastwood began work on the third Dollars film, The Good, the Bad and the Ugly, again playing the mysterious Man with No Name. Lee Van Cleef returned as a ruthless fortune seeker, with Eli Wallach portraying the cunning Mexican bandit Tuco Ramirez. The storyline involved the search for a cache of Confederate gold buried in a cemetery. During the filming of a scene in which a bridge was blown up, Eastwood urged Wallach to retreat to a hilltop. "I know about these things," he said. "Stay as far away from special effects and explosives as you can."[59] Minutes later confusion among the crew over the word "Vaya!" resulted in a premature explosion that could have killed Wallach.[59]

"I wanted to play it with an economy of words and create this whole feeling through attitude and movement. It was just the kind of character I had envisioned for a long time, keep to the mystery and allude to what happened in the past. It came about after the frustration of doing Rawhide for so long. I felt the less he said, the stronger he became and the more he grew in the imagination of the audience."

The Dollars trilogy was not released in the United States until 1967, when A Fistful of Dollars opened in January, followed by For a Few Dollars More in May, and The Good, the Bad and the Ugly on December 29, 1967.[61] All the films were commercially successful, particularly The Good, the Bad and the Ugly which eventually earned $8 million (56.6 million in 2015 dollars[29]) in rental earnings and turned Eastwood into a major film star.[61] All three films received bad reviews, and marked the beginning of a battle for Eastwood to win American film critics' respect.[62]Judith Crist described A Fistful of Dollars as "cheapjack",[63] while Newsweek considered For a Few Dollars More as "excruciatingly dopey".[62]Renata Adler of The New York Times said The Good, the Bad and the Ugly was "the most expensive, pious and repellent movie in the history of its peculiar genre".[64]Time magazine drew attention to the film's wooden acting, especially on the part of Eastwood, though a few critics such as Vincent Canby and Bosley Crowther of The New York Times praised Eastwood's coolness in playing the tall, lone stranger.[65] Leone's cinematography was widely acclaimed, even by critics who disparaged the acting in the film.[62]

Stardom brought more roles for Eastwood. He signed to star in the American revisionist western Hang 'Em High (1968), featured alongside Inger Stevens, Pat Hingle, Dennis Hopper, Ed Begley, Alan Hale, Ben Johnson, Bruce Dern, and James MacArthur,[66] playing a man who takes up a Marshal's badge and seeks revenge as a lawman after being lynched by vigilantes and left for dead.[67] The film earned Eastwood a fee of $400,000 (2.71 million in 2015 dollars[29]) and 25 percent of its net box-office takings.[66] Using money earned from the Dollars trilogy, accountant and Eastwood advisor Irving Leonard helped establish Eastwood's own production company, Malpaso Productions, named after Malpaso Creek on Eastwood's property in Monterey County, California. Leonard arranged for Hang 'Em High to be a joint production with United Artists;[68] when it opened in July 1968, it had an unprecedented opening weekend in United Artists' history. Hang 'Em High was widely praised by critics, including Archer Winsten of the New York Post who described it as, "a western of quality, courage, danger and excitement".[12]

Before the release of Hang 'Em High Eastwood had already begun working on Coogan's Bluff, about an Arizona deputy sheriff tracking a wanted psychopathic criminal (Don Stroud) through the streets of New York City. He was reunited with Universal Studios for it after receiving an offer of $1 million (7.07 million in 2015 dollars[29])—more than double his previous salary.[69]Jennings Lang arranged for Eastwood to meet Don Siegel, a Universal contract director who later became Eastwood's close friend, forming a partnership that would last more than ten years and produce five films.[70] Shooting began in November 1967, before the script had been finalized.[71] The film was controversial for its portrayal of violence.[72][73]Coogan's Bluff also became the first collaboration with Argentine composer Lalo Schifrin, who would later compose the jazzy score to several Eastwood films in the 1970s and 1980s, including the Dirty Harry films.

Eastwood was paid $750,000 (5.09 million in 2015 dollars[29]) in 1968 for the war epic Where Eagles Dare,[74] about a World War II squad parachuting into a Gestapo stronghold in the alpine mountains. Richard Burton played the squad's commander, with Eastwood as his right-hand man. Eastwood was also cast as Two-Face in the Batman television show, but the series was canceled before filming began.[75]

In 1970, Eastwood starred with Shirley MacLaine in the western Two Mules for Sister Sara, directed by Don Siegel. The film follows an American mercenary, who gets mixed up with a prostitute disguised as a nun, and ends up helping a group of Juarista rebels during the reign of Emperor Maximilian I of Mexico.[78][79] Eastwood once again played a mysterious stranger—unshaven, wearing a serape-like vest, and smoking a cigar.[80] Although it received moderate reviews,[81][82][83] the film is listed in The New York Times Guide to the Best 1,000 Movies Ever Made.[84] Later the same year, Eastwood starred as one of a group of Americans who steal a fortune in gold from the Nazis, in the World War II film Kelly's Heroes, with Donald Sutherland and Telly Savalas. Kelly's Heroes was the last film in which Eastwood appeared, that was not produced by his own Malpaso Productions.[85] Filming commenced in July 1969 on location in Yugoslavia and in London.[86] The film received mostly a positive reception and its anti-war sentiments were recognized.[85] In the winter of 1969–70, Eastwood and Siegel began planning his next film, The Beguiled, a tale of a wounded Union soldier, held captive by the sexually repressed matron (played by Geraldine Page) of a Southern girl's school.[87] Upon release the film received major recognition in France and is considered one of Eastwood's finest works by the French.[88] However, it grossed less than $1 million (6.07 million in 2015 dollars[29]) and, according to Eastwood and Lang, flopped due to poor publicity and the "emasculated" role of Eastwood.[89]

Eastwood's career reached a turning point in 1971.[90] Before Irving Leonard died, he and Eastwood had discussed the idea of Malpaso producing Play Misty for Me, a film that was to give Eastwood the artistic control he desired, and his debut as a director.[91] The script was about a jazz disc jockey named Dave (Eastwood), who has a casual affair with Evelyn (Jessica Walter), a listener who had been calling the radio station repeatedly at night, asking him to play her favorite song — Erroll Garner's "Misty". When Dave ends their relationship, the unhinged Evelyn becomes a murderous stalker.[92] Filming commenced in Monterey in September 1970 and included footage of that year's Monterey Jazz Festival.[93] The film was highly acclaimed with critics, such as Jay Cocks in Time, Andrew Sarris in the Village Voice, and Archer Winsten in the New York Post all praising the film, as well as Eastwood's directorial skills and performance.[94] Walter was nominated for a Golden Globe Best Actress Award (Drama), for her performance in the film.

"I know what you're thinking — 'Did he fire six shots or only five?' Well, to tell you the truth, in all this excitement, I've kinda lost track myself. But, being as this is a .44 Magnum, the most powerful handgun in the world and would blow your head clean off, you've got to ask yourself one question: 'Do I feel lucky?' Well, do you, punk?"

Dirty Harry (1971), written by Harry and Rita Fink, centers around a hard-edged New York City (later changed to San Francisco) police inspector named Harry Callahan who is determined to stop a psychotic killer by any means.[95]Dirty Harry has been described as being arguably Eastwood's most memorable character, and the film has been credited with inventing the "loose-cannon cop" genre.[96][97] Author Eric Lichtenfeld argues that Eastwood's role as Dirty Harry established the "first true archetype" of the action film genre.[98] His lines (quoted right) are regarded by firearms historians, such as Garry James and Richard Venola, as the force which catapulted the ownership of .44 Magnum revolvers to unprecedented heights in the United States; specifically the Smith & Wesson Model 29 carried by Harry Callahan.[99][100]Dirty Harry achieved huge success after its release in December 1971, earning $22 million (128 million in 2015 dollars[29]) in the United States and Canada alone.[101] It was Siegel's highest-grossing film and the start of a series of films featuring the character Harry Callahan. Although a number of critics praised Eastwood's performance as Dirty Harry, such as Jay Cocks of Time magazine who described him as "giving his best performance so far, tense, tough, full of implicit identification with his character",[102] the film was also widely criticized and accused of being fascistic.[103][104][105]

Following Sean Connery's announcement that he would not play James Bond again, Eastwood was offered the role but turned it down because he believed the character should be played by an English actor.[106] He next starred in the loner Western Joe Kidd (1972), based on a character inspired by Reies Lopez Tijerina, who stormed a courthouse in Tierra Amarilla, New Mexico in June 1967. During filming, Eastwood suffered symptoms of a bronchial infection and several panic attacks.[107]Joe Kidd received a mixed reception, with Roger Greenspun of The New York Times writing that it was unremarkable, with foolish symbolism and sloppy editing, although he praised Eastwood's performance.[108]

In 1973, Eastwood directed his first western, High Plains Drifter, in which he also starred. The film had a moral and supernatural theme, later emulated in Pale Rider. The plot follows a mysterious stranger (Eastwood) who arrives in a brooding Western town where the people hire him to protect them against three soon-to-be-released felons. There remains confusion during the film as to whether the stranger is the brother of the deputy, whom the felons lynched and murdered, or his ghost. Holes in the plot were filled with black humor and allegory, influenced by Leone.[109] The revisionist film received a mixed reception, but was a major box office success. A number of critics thought Eastwood's directing was "as derivative as it was expressive", with Arthur Knight of the Saturday Review remarking that Eastwood had "absorbed the approaches of Siegel and Leone and fused them with his own paranoid vision of society".[110]John Wayne, who had declined a role in the film, sent a letter to Eastwood soon after the film's release in which he complained that, "the townspeople did not represent the true spirit of the American pioneer, the spirit that made America great".[111]

Eastwood next turned his attention towards Breezy (1973), a film about love blossoming between a middle-aged man and a teenage girl. During casting for the film Eastwood met Sondra Locke for the first time, an actress who would play major roles in six of his films over the next ten years and would become an important figure in his life.[112]Kay Lenz got the part of Breezy because Locke, at age 29, was considered too old. The film, shot very quickly and efficiently by Eastwood and Frank Stanley, came in $1 million (5.31 million in 2015 dollars[29]) under budget and was finished three days ahead of schedule.[113]Breezy was not a major critical or commercial success and it was only made available on video in 1998.[114]

Once filming of Breezy had finished, Warners announced that Eastwood had agreed to reprise his role as Callahan in Magnum Force (1973), a sequel to Dirty Harry, about a group of rogue young officers (among them David Soul, Robert Urich and Tim Matheson) in the San Francisco Police Department who systematically exterminate the city's worst criminals.[115] Although the film was a major success after release, grossing $58.1 million (309 million in 2015 dollars[29]) in the United States (a record for Eastwood), it was not a critical success.[116][117]The New York Times critic Nora Sayre panned the often contradictory moral themes of the film, while the paper's Frank Rich called it "the same old stuff".[117]

In 1974, Eastwood teamed up with Jeff Bridges and George Kennedy in the buddy action caper Thunderbolt and Lightfoot, a road movie about a veteran bank robber Thunderbolt (Eastwood) and a young con man drifter, Lightfoot (Bridges). On its release, in spring 1974, the film was praised for its offbeat comedy mixed with high suspense and tragedy but was only a modest success at the box office, earning $32.4 million (155 million in 2015 dollars[29]).[118] Eastwood's acting was noted by critics, but was overshadowed by Bridges who was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor. Eastwood reportedly fumed at the lack of Academy Award recognition for him and swore that he would never work for United Artists again.[118][119]

Eastwood's next film The Eiger Sanction (1975) was based on Trevanian's critically acclaimed spy novel of the same name. Eastwood plays Jonathan Hemlock in a role originally intended for Paul Newman, an assassin turned college art professor who decides to return to his former profession for one last "sanction" in return for a rare Pissarro painting. In the process he must climb the north face of the Eiger in Switzerland under perilous conditions. Once again Eastwood starred alongside George Kennedy. Mike Hoover taught Eastwood how to climb during several weeks of preparation at Yosemite in the summer of 1974 before filming commenced in Grindelwald on August 12, 1974.[120][121] Despite prior warnings about the perils of the Eiger the film crew suffered a number of accidents, including one fatality.[122][123] Despite the danger, Eastwood insisted on doing all his own climbing and stunts. Upon release in May 1975 The Eiger Sanction was a commercial failure, receiving only $23.8 million (104 million in 2015 dollars[29]) at the box office, and was poorly received by most critics.[124] Joy Gould Boyum of the Wall Street Journal dismissed the film as "brutal fantasy".[124][125] Eastwood blamed Universal Studios for the film's poor promotion and turned his back on them to make an agreement with Warner Brothers, through Frank Wells, that has lasted to the present day.[126]

The Outlaw Josey Wales (1976), a western inspired by Asa Carter's 1972 novel of the same name,[127] has lead character Josey Wales (Eastwood) as a pro-Confederate guerilla who refuses to surrender his arms after the American Civil War and is chased across the old southwest by a group of enforcers. Eastwood's costars were Locke (for the first time) and Chief Dan George. Director Philip Kaufman was fired by producer Bob Daley under Eastwood's command, resulting in a fine reported to be around $60,000 (248,667 in 2015 dollars[29]) from the Directors Guild of America—who subsequently passed new legislation reserving the right to impose a major fine on a producer for discharging and replacing a director.[128] The film was pre-screened at the Sun Valley Center for the Arts and Humanities in Idaho during a six-day conference entitled Western Movies: Myths and Images. Invited to the screening were a number of esteemed film critics, including Jay Cocks and Arthur Knight; directors such as King Vidor, William Wyler, and Howard Hawks; and a number of academics.[129] Upon release in the summer of 1976 The Outlaw Josey Wales was widely acclaimed, with many critics and viewers seeing Eastwood's role as an iconic one that related to America's ancestral past and the destiny of the nation after the American Civil War.[129]Roger Ebert compared the nature and vulnerability of Eastwood's portrayal of Josey Wales with his Man with No Name character in the Dollars westerns and praised the film's atmosphere.[130] The film would later appear in Time '​s "Top 10 Films of the Year".[131]

In 1977, he directed and starred in The Gauntlet opposite Locke, Pat Hingle, William Prince, Bill McKinney, and Mara Corday. Eastwood portrays a down-and-out cop assigned to escort a prostitute from Las Vegas to Phoenix to testify against the mafia. Although a moderate hit with the viewing public, critics had mixed feelings about the film, with many believing it was overly violent. Ebert, in contrast, gave the film three stars and called it "... classic Clint Eastwood: fast, furious, and funny."[136] The following year, he starred in Every Which Way But Loose in an uncharacteristic offbeat comedy role. He played Philo Beddoe, a trucker and brawler who roams the American West searching for a lost love (Locke) accompanied by his brother (played by Geoffrey Lewis) and an orangutan called Clyde. The film proved surprisingly successful upon its release and became Eastwood's most commercially successful film up to that time. Panned by critics, it ranked high among the box office successes of his career and was the second-highest grossing film of 1978.[137]

In 1980, Eastwood directed and played the title role in Bronco Billy alongside Locke, Scatman Crothers, and Sam Bottoms.[140] Eastwood has cited Bronco Billy as being one of the most relaxed shoots of his career and biographer Richard Schickel has argued that Bronco Billy is Eastwood's most self-referential character.[141][142] The film was a rare commercial disappointment in Eastwood's career,[143] but was liked by critics. Janet Maslin of The New York Times wrote that film was "the best and funniest Clint Eastwood movie in quite a while", and praised Eastwood's directing and the way he intricately juxtaposes the old West and the new.[144] Later that year, Eastwood starred in Any Which Way You Can, the sequel to Every Which Way But Loose. The film received a number of bad reviews from critics, although Maslin described it as "funnier and even better than its predecessor".[143] Released over the Christmas season of 1980, Any Which Way You Can was a major box office success and ranked among the top five highest-grossing films of the year.[145]

Eastwood directed and starred in the fourth Dirty Harry film, Sudden Impact, which was shot in the spring and summer of 1983 and is considered the darkest and most violent of the series.[150] By this time Eastwood received 60 percent of all profits from films he starred in and directed, with the rest going to the studio.[151]Sudden Impact was his final on-screen collaboration with Locke. She plays an artist who, along with her sister, was gang-raped a decade before the story takes place and seeks revenge for her sister's now-vegetative state by systematically murdering the rapists. The line "Go ahead, make my day" (uttered by Eastwood during an early scene in a coffee shop) has been cited as one of cinema's immortal lines. It was quoted by PresidentRonald Reagan in a speech to Congress, and used during the 1984 presidential elections.[152][153][154] The film was the second most commercially successful of the Dirty Harry films, after The Enforcer, earning $70 million (166 million in 2015 dollars[29]). It received very positive reviews, with many critics praising the feminist aspects of the film through its explorations of the physical and psychological consequences of rape.[155]

Tightrope (1984) had Eastwood starring opposite Geneviève Bujold in a provocative thriller, inspired by newspaper articles about an elusive Bay Area rapist. Set in New Orleans to avoid confusion with the Dirty Harry films,[156] Eastwood played a divorced cop drawn into his target's tortured psychology and fascination for sadomasochism.[157]Tightrope was a critical and commercial hit and became the fourth highest-grossing R-rated film of 1984.[158] Eastwood next starred in the crime comedy City Heat (1984) alongside Burt Reynolds, a film about a private eye and his partner who get mixed up with gangsters in the prohibition era of the 1930s. The film grossed around $50 million (114 million in 2015 dollars[29]) domestically, but was overshadowed by Eddie Murphy's Beverly Hills Cop.[159]

"Westerns. A period gone by, the pioneer, the loner operating by himself, without benefit of society. It usually has something to do with some sort of vengeance; he takes care of the vengeance himself, doesn't call the police. Like Robin Hood. It's the last masculine frontier. Romantic myth, I guess, though it's hard to think about anything romantic today. In a Western you can think, Jesus, there was a time when man was alone, on horseback, out there where man hasn't spoiled the land yet."

—Eastwood, on the philosophical allure of portraying western loners[160]

Eastwood made his only foray into TV direction with the 1985 Amazing Stories episode "Vanessa in the Garden", which starred Harvey Keitel and Locke. This was his first collaboration with Steven Spielberg, who later co-produced Flags of Our Fathers and Letters from Iwo Jima.[161] He would revisit the Western genre when he directed and starred in Pale Rider (1985), a film based on the classic 1953 western Shane and follows a preacher descending from the mists of the Sierras to side with the miners during the California Gold Rush of 1850.[162] The title is a reference to the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, as the rider of the pale horse is Death, and shows similarities to Eastwood's 1973 western High Plains Drifter in its themes of morality and justice as well as its exploration of the supernatural.[163]Pale Rider became one of Eastwood's most successful films to date. It was hailed as one of the best films of 1985 and the best western to appear for a considerable period, with Gene Siskel of the Chicago Tribune remarking, "This year (1985) will go down in film history as the moment Clint Eastwood finally earned respect as an artist".[164]

Eastwood starred in The Dead Pool (1988), the fifth and final film in the Dirty Harry series. It co-starred Patricia Clarkson, Liam Neeson, and a young Jim Carrey who plays Johnny Squares, a drug-addled rock star and the first of the victims on a list of celebrities drawn up by horror film director Peter Swan (Neeson) who are deemed most likely to die, the so-called "Dead Pool". The list is stolen by an obsessed fan who, in mimicking his favorite director, makes his way through the list killing off celebrities, of which Dirty Harry is also included. The Dead Pool grossed nearly $38 million (75.8 million in 2015 dollars), relatively low receipts for a Dirty Harry film and it is generally viewed as the weakest film of the series, although Roger Ebert perceived it to be as good as the original.[169][170]

Eastwood began working on smaller, more personal projects and experienced a lull in his career between 1988 and 1992. Always interested in jazz, he directed Bird (1988), a biopic starring Forest Whitaker as jazz musician Charlie "Bird" Parker. Alto saxophonist Jackie McLean and Spike Lee, son of jazz bassist Bill Lee and a long time critic of Eastwood, criticized the characterization of Charlie Parker remarking that it did not capture his true essence and sense of humor.[171] Eastwood received two Golden Globes for the film, the Cecil B. DeMille Award for his lifelong contribution, and the Best Director award. However, Bird was a commercial failure, earning just $11 million, which Eastwood attributed to the declining interest in jazz among black people.[172] Carrey would appear with Eastwood again in the poorly received comedy Pink Cadillac (1989). The film is about a bounty hunter and a group of white supremacists chasing an innocent woman (Bernadette Peters) who tries to outrun everyone in her husband's prized pink Cadillac. The film failed both critically and commercially,[173] earning barely more than Bird and marking a low point in Eastwood's career.[174]

Eastwood directed and starred in White Hunter Black Heart (1990), an adaptation of Peter Viertel's roman à clef, about John Huston and the making of the classic film The African Queen. Shot on location in Zimbabwe in the summer of 1989,[175] the film received some critical attention but with only a limited release earned just $8.4 million (15.2 million in 2015 dollars[29]).[176] Later in 1990, Eastwood directed and co-starred with Charlie Sheen in The Rookie, a buddy cop action film. Critics found the film's plot and characterization unconvincing, but praised its action sequences.[177] An ongoing lawsuit, in response to Eastwood allegedly ramming a woman's car,[178] resulted in no Eastwood films being shown in cinemas in 1991.[179] Eastwood won the suit and agreed to pay the complainant's legal fees if she did not appeal.[179]

"... if possible, he looks even taller, leaner and more mysteriously possessed than he did in Sergio Leone's seminal Fistful of Dollars a quarter of a century ago. The years haven't softened him. They have given him the presence of some fierce force of nature, which may be why the landscapes of the mythic, late 19th-century West become him, never more so than in his new Unforgiven. ... This is his richest, most satisfying performance since the underrated, politically lunatic Heartbreak Ridge. There's no one like him."

In 1992, Eastwood revisited the western genre in the self-directed film Unforgiven, in which he played an aging ex-gunfighter long past his prime. Scripts existed for the film as early as 1976 under titles such as The Cut-Whore Killings and The William Munny Killings but Eastwood delayed the project because he wanted to wait until he was old enough to play his character and to savor it as the last of his western films.[179]Unforgiven was a major commercial and critical success; Jack Methews of the Los Angeles Times described it as "the finest classical western to come along since perhaps John Ford's 1956 The Searchers.[181] The film was nominated for nine Academy Awards,[182] (including Best Actor for Eastwood and Best Original Screenplay for David Webb Peoples) and won four, including Best Picture and Best Director for Eastwood. In June 2008 Unforgiven was ranked as the fourth-best American western, behind Shane, High Noon, and The Searchers, in the American Film Institute's "AFI's 10 Top 10" list.[183][184]

"The roles that Eastwood has played, and the films that he has directed, cannot be disentangled from the nature of the American culture of the last quarter century, its fantasies and its realities."

—Author Edward Gallafent, commenting on Eastwood's impact on film from the 1970s to 1990s[198]

Eastwood directed and starred in True Crime (1999). He plays Steve Everett, a journalist and recovering alcoholic, who has to cover the execution of murderer Frank Beechum (played by Isaiah Washington). True Crime received a mixed reception, with Janet Maslin of The New York Times writing, "his direction is galvanized by a sense of second chances and tragic misunderstandings, and by contrasting a larger sense of justice with the peculiar minutiae of crime. Perhaps he goes a shade too far in the latter direction, though."[199] The film was a box office failure, earning less than half its $55 million (77.9 million in 2015 dollars[29]) budget and was Eastwood's worst-performing film of the 1990s aside from White Hunter Black Heart, which had a limited release.[200]

In 2000, Eastwood directed and starred in Space Cowboys alongside Tommy Lee Jones, Donald Sutherland and James Garner. Eastwood played one of a group of veteran ex-test pilots sent into space to repair an old Soviet satellite. The original music score was composed by Eastwood and Lennie Niehaus. Space Cowboys was critically well received and holds a 79 percent rating at Rotten Tomatoes,[201] although Roger Ebert wrote that the film was, "too secure within its traditional story structure to make much seem at risk."[202] The film grossed more than $90 million in its United States release, more than Eastwood's two previous films combined.[203] In 2002, Eastwood played an ex-FBI agent chasing a sadistic killer (Jeff Daniels) in the thriller Blood Work, loosely based on the 1998 novel of the same name by Michael Connelly. The film was a commercial failure, grossing just $26.2 million (34.4 million in 2015 dollars[29]) on an estimated budget of $50 million (65.6 million in 2015 dollars[29]) and received mixed reviews, with Rotten Tomatoes describing it as, "well-made but marred by lethargic pacing".[204] Eastwood did, however, win the Future Film Festival Digital Award at the Venice Film Festival for the film.

"Clint is a true artist in every respect. Despite his years of being at the top of his game and the legendary movies he has made, he always made us feel comfortable and valued on the set, treating us as equals."

The following year Eastwood found further critical and commercial success when he directed, produced, scored and starred in the boxing drama Million Dollar Baby, playing a cantankerous trainer who forms a bond with female boxer (Hilary Swank), whom he is persuaded to train by his longtime friend and employee (Morgan Freeman). The film won four Academy Awards for Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actress (Swank) and Best Supporting Actor (Freeman).[208] At age 74 Eastwood became the oldest of eighteen directors to have directed two or more Best Picture winners.[209][210] He also received a nomination for Best Actor, as well as a Grammy nomination for his score,[211] and won a Golden Globe for Best Director, which was presented to him by daughter Kathryn, who was Miss Golden Globe at the 2005 ceremony.[212]A. O. Scott of The New York Times lauded the film as a "masterpiece" and the best film of the year.[213]

Eastwood next directed Changeling (2008), based on a true story set in the late 1920s. Angelina Jolie stars as a woman reunited with her missing son only to realize he is an impostor.[215] After its release at several film festivals the film grossed over $110 million (120 million in 2015 dollars[29]), the majority of which came from foreign markets.[216] The film was highly acclaimed, with Damon Wise of Empire describing Changeling as "flawless".[217]Todd McCarthy of Variety described it as "emotionally powerful and stylistically sure-handed" and that the film's characters and social commentary were brought into the story with an "almost breathtaking deliberation".[218] For the film Eastwood received nominations for Best Original Score at the 66th Golden Globe Awards, Best Direction at the 62nd British Academy Film Awards and director of the year from the London Film Critics' Circle.

Eastwood ended a four-year "self-imposed acting hiatus"[219] by appearing in Gran Torino, which he also directed, produced and partly scored with his son Kyle and Jamie Cullum. Biographer Marc Eliot called Eastwood's role "an amalgam of the Man with No Name, Dirty Harry, and William Munny, here aged and cynical but willing and able to fight on whenever the need arose".[220]Gran Torino grossed almost $30 million (32.9 million in 2015 dollars[29]) during its opening weekend release in January 2009, the highest of his career as an actor or director.[221]Gran Torino eventually grossed over $268 million (294 million in 2015 dollars[29]) in theaters worldwide, becoming the highest-grossing film of Eastwood's career so far (without adjustment for inflation).

In 2010, Eastwood directed Hereafter, again working with Matt Damon, who portrayed a psychic. The film had its world premiere on September 12, 2010 at the 2010 Toronto International Film Festival and had a limited release later in October.[225][226]Hereafter received mixed reviews from critics, with the consensus at Rotten Tomatoes being, "Despite a thought-provoking premise and Clint Eastwood's typical flair as director, Hereafter fails to generate much compelling drama, straddling the line between poignant sentimentality and hokey tedium."[227] In the same year, Eastwood served as executive producer for a Turner Classic Movies (TCM) documentary about jazz pianist Dave Brubeck, Dave Brubeck: In His Own Sweet Way, to commemorate Brubeck's 90th birthday.[228]

In 2011, Eastwood directed J. Edgar, a biopic of FBI directorJ. Edgar Hoover, with Leonardo DiCaprio in the title role.[229] The film received mixed reviews, although DiCaprio's performance as Hoover was widely praised. The Rotten Tomatoes consensus was, "Leonardo DiCaprio gives a predictably powerhouse performance, but J. Edgar stumbles in all other departments".[230]Roger Ebert wrote that the film is "fascinating", "masterful", and praised DiCaprio's performance. David Edelstein of New York Magazine, while also praising DiCaprio, wrote, "It's too bad J. Edgar is so shapeless and turgid and ham-handed, so rich in bad lines and worse readings".[231] In January 2011, it was announced that Eastwood was in talks to direct Beyoncé Knowles in a third remake of the 1937 filmA Star Is Born;[232] however, the project was delayed due to Beyoncé's pregnancy. Eastwood then starred in the baseball drama Trouble with the Curve (2012), as a veteran baseball scout who travels with his daughter for a final scouting trip. Robert Lorenz, who worked with Eastwood as an assistant director on several films, directed the film.[233]

"Everybody wonders why I continue working at this stage. I keep working because there's always new stories. ... And as long as people want me to tell them, I'll be there doing them."

During Super Bowl XLVI, Eastwood narrated a halftime advertisement for Chrysler titled "It’s Halftime in America".[235] The advertisement was criticized by several U.S. Republicans, who claimed it implied that President Barack Obama deserved a second term.[236] In response to the criticism, Eastwood stated, "I am certainly not politically affiliated with Mr. Obama. It was meant to be a message about job growth and the spirit of America."[237]

Beginning with the thriller Play Misty for Me, Eastwood has directed over 30 films, including Westerns, action films, and dramas. He is one of few top Hollywood actors to have also become a critically and commercially successful director. The New Yorker wrote that, unlike Eastwood,[241]

From the very early days of his career Eastwood was frustrated by directors' insistence that scenes be re-shot multiple times and perfected, and when he began directing in 1970, he made a conscious attempt to avoid any aspects of directing he had been indifferent to as an actor. As a result, Eastwood is renowned for his efficient film directing and ability to reduce filming time and to keep budgets under control. He usually avoids actors' rehearsing and prefers most scenes to be completed on the first take;[242][243] Eastwood's rapid filmmaking practices have been compared to those of Woody Allen, Ingmar Bergman, Jean-Luc Godard, and the Coen brothers. When acting in others' films he sometimes takes over directing, such as for The Outlaw Josey Wales, if he believes production is too slow.[241] In preparation for filming Eastwood rarely uses storyboards for developing the layout of a shooting schedule.[244][245][246] He also attempts to reduce script background details on characters to allow the audience to become more involved in the film,[247] considering their imagination a requirement for a film that connects with viewers.[247][248] Eastwood has indicated that he lays out a film's plot to provide the audience with necessary details, but not "so much that it insults their intelligence."[249]

According to Life magazine, "Eastwood's style is to shoot first and act afterward. He etches his characters virtually without words. He has developed the art of underplaying to the point that anyone around him who so much as flinches looks hammily histrionic."[250] Interviewers Richard Thompson and Tim Hunter note that Eastwood's films are "superbly paced: unhurried; cool; and [give] a strong sense of real time, regardless of the speed of the narrative"[251] while Ric Gentry considers Eastwood's pacing to be "unrushed and relaxed".[252] Eastwood is fond of low-key lighting and back-lighting to give his movies a "noir-ish" feel.[243][253]

Eastwood's frequent exploration of ethical values has drawn the attention of scholars, who have explored Eastwood's work from ethical and theological perspectives, including his portrayal of justice, mercy, suicide and the angel of death.[254]

Eastwood, aged 23, married Maggie Johnson on December 19, 1953, six months after they met on a blind date.[265] However, the marriage would not prove altogether smooth, with Eastwood commenting that he had married too early.[266] A decade later, during a trial separation from Johnson, an affair Eastwood had with dancer Roxanne Tunis produced his first child, Kimber Eastwood (born Kimber Tunis; June 17, 1964),[267][268] whose existence was kept secret from the public until July 1989, when the National Enquirer revealed her identity.[269] After a reconciliation, he and Johnson had two children together: Kyle Eastwood (born May 19, 1968) and Alison Eastwood (born May 22, 1972), though he was absent from both births.[270] Johnson filed for legal separation in 1978 after another long period of estrangement, but did not officially divorce Eastwood until May 1984,[271][272] receiving a reported cash settlement of $25 million.[273]

Eastwood's relationship with actress Sondra Locke began in the autumn of 1975 while filming The Outlaw Josey Wales. They lived together for nearly 14 years, although Locke remained legally married to her openly gay husband, Gordon Anderson.[274][275] Eastwood befriended Locke's husband and purchased a house on Crescent Heights Boulevard in West Hollywood for Anderson and his male companion.[268] In the late 1970s, Locke underwent two abortions and a tubal ligation,[276] later stating it was a "mutual decision" to have the procedures.[277] Eastwood and Locke went on to star in five more films together: The Gauntlet, Every Which Way But Loose, Bronco Billy, Any Which Way You Can, and Sudden Impact. On April 10, 1989, while Locke was away directing the film Impulse, Eastwood had the locks changed on their Bel-Air home and ordered her possessions to be boxed and put in storage.[278] Locke filed a palimony suit against Eastwood, and later sued him a second time for fraud, alleging that a directing pact he set up for her at Warner Bros. in exchange for dropping the first lawsuit was a sham.[279][280] In 1996, minutes before a jury was to render a verdict in Locke's favor, Eastwood agreed to settle for an undisclosed amount.[281] In her autobiography, The Good, the Bad, and the Very Ugly,[282] Locke described Eastwood as "a monster who thought nothing of destroying anything inconvenient to him."[283]

During the last three years of his cohabitation with Locke, Eastwood secretly fathered two children with flight attendant Jacelyn Reeves:[255] a son Scott Eastwood (born Scott Reeves; March 21, 1986)[284] and daughter Kathryn Eastwood (born Kathryn Reeves; February 2, 1988).[272] According to biographer McGilligan, "he and Reeves had got together at the premiere of Pale Rider, they had slept together on impulse, she had got pregnant, and since she made no great demands on Clint, he later repeated the experience."[285] The birth certificates for both children stated "Father declined."[286] The affair was first reported in the Star tabloid in 1990,[287][288] but went unmentioned by mainstream news sources for more than a decade.[289]

Eastwood subsequently started dating Dina Ruiz, a television news anchor 35 years his junior, whom he had first met when she interviewed him in 1993.[291] They married on March 31, 1996, when Eastwood surprised her with a private ceremony at a home on the Shadow Creek Golf Course in Las Vegas.[293] The couple has one daughter, Morgan Eastwood (born December 12, 1996).[294]

In August 2013, Dina Eastwood announced that she and her husband had been living separately for an undisclosed length of time.[295] On October 23, 2013, Dina filed for divorce after she withdrew her request of a separation citing irreconcilable differences. She asked for full custody of their 16-year-old daughter, Morgan, as well as spousal support.[296] By this time, Eastwood, 83, was in a relationship with Erica Tomlinson-Fisher, 41.[297]

Despite smoking in some of his films, Eastwood is a lifelong non-smoker, has been conscious of his health and fitness since he was a teenager, and practices healthful eating and daily Transcendental Meditation.[298][299][300]

He opened an old English-inspired pub called the Hog's Breath Inn in Carmel-by-the-Sea in 1971.[301] Eastwood sold the pub and now owns the Mission Ranch Hotel and Restaurant located in Carmel-by-the-Sea.[302][303]

Despite being heavily associated with firearms in his Westerns and cop movies, Eastwood has publicly endorsed gun control since at least 1973. In the April 24, 1973, edition of The Washington Post, the star stated that "I'm for gun legislation myself. I don't hunt."[329] Two years later, in 1975, Eastwood told People magazine that he favors "gun control to some degree".[330] About a year later, Eastwood remarked that "All guns should be registered. I don't think legitimate gun owners would mind that kind of legislation. Right now the furor against a gun law is by gun owners who are overreacting. They're worried that all guns are going to be recalled. It's impossible to take guns out of circulation, and that's why firearms should be registered and mail-order delivery of guns halted."[331] In 1993, he noted that he "... was always a backer" of the Brady Bill, with its federally mandated waiting period.[332] In 1995, Eastwood questioned the purpose of assault weapons. Larry King, the television host and newspaper columnist, wrote in the May 22, 1995, edition of USA Today that "My interview with Eastwood will air on 'Larry King Weekend' ... I asked him his thoughts on the NRA and gun control and he said that while people think of him as pro-gun, he has always been in favor of controls. 'Why would anyone need or want an assault weapon?' he said."[333]

During the 2008 United States presidential election, Eastwood stated that he would be voting for John McCain,[342] citing the fact that he had known McCain since he returned to the US in 1973 as a recently released POW. Eastwood said of McCain: "I met him years ago when he first came back from Vietnam. This was back when (Ronald) Reagan was the governor of California and he had a big function for all of the prisoners of war who were released. I thought he was a terrific guy, a real American hero." Nevertheless, Eastwood wished Barack Obama well upon his subsequent victory saying, "Obama is my president now and I am going to be wishing him the very best because it is what is best for all of us."[343] Eastwood stated in 2010 of President Obama: "I think he's a nice fella and I enjoyed watching him come along and I enjoyed watching him campaign and win the job. But I'm not a fan of what he's doing at the moment. ... I just don't think he's governing. I don't think he's surrounded himself with the people he could have surrounded himself with."[344]

In January 2011, Eastwood told the UK's Daily Mail that "I loved the fact that Obama is multi-racial. I thought that was terrific, as my wife is the same racial make-up. But I felt he was a greenhorn, and it turned out he didn't have experience in decision-making." As for McCain, Eastwood reflected, "I voted for McCain, not because he was a Republican, but because he had been through war (in Vietnam) and I thought he might understand the war in Iraq better than somebody who hadn't. I didn't agree with him on a lot of stuff."[314] On August 3, 2012, he attended a fundraiser for Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney, suggesting that Romney would boost the country and "restore a decent tax system ... so that there's a fairness and people are not pitted against one another as [to] who's paying taxes and who isn't."[346] During a speech at the 2012 Republican National Convention, Eastwood talked to an empty chair as if President Barack Obama were sitting in it.[347][348][349] The speech was met with a huge response by the media with both praise and criticism. Eastwood, who said he came up with the speech 5 seconds before he gave it, said that if he could do it again he would say something different. “My only message was [that] I wanted people to take the idolizing factor out of every contestant out there. Just look at the work, look at the background, and then make a judgment on that. I was just trying to say that, and did it in kind of a roundabout way which took a lot more time, I suppose, than they would have liked.” I’d probably say something else but I’d try to get the same message across so that people don’t have to kiss up to politicians. No matter what party they’re in, you should evaluate their work and make your judgments accordingly. That’s the way to do it in life and every other subject, but sometimes in America we get gaga, we look at the wrong values.”[350]

Due to his speech at the 2012 Republican National Convention, some see him as a warmonger or right-wing poster boy, however, Eastwood said he has always opposed war, and is a pragmatic Libertarian rather than a red-meat Republican. Eastwood further explained his anti-war stance by saying "I was a child growing up during World War II. That was supposed to be the one to end all wars. And four years later, I was standing at the draft board being drafted during the Korean conflict, and then after that there was Vietnam, and it goes on and on forever . . . I just wonder . . . does this ever stop? And no, it doesn’t. So each time we get in these conflicts, it deserves a lot of thought before we go wading in or wading out. Going in or coming out. It needs a better thought process, I think." Furthermore, Eastwood's 2014 movie American Sniper was met with strong critical praise, especially from many Republicans who called it a Pro-War on Terror, Pro-Republican and a patriotic film; Eastwood responded by saying it was a "stupid analysis" and that the movie had nothing to do with political parties.[351] Eastwood responded to critics of American Sniper by saying his film was "the biggest anti-war statement any film can make" and that "the fact of what [war] does to the family and the people who have to go back into civilian life like Chris Kyle did" and “what it (war) does to the people left behind.”[352]

Eastwood favors jazz (especially bebop), blues, classic rhythm and blues, classical, and country-and-western music; his favorite musicians include saxophonists Charlie Parker and Lester Young, pianists Thelonious Monk, Oscar Peterson, Dave Brubeck, and Fats Waller, and Delta bluesmanRobert Johnson.[353] He is also a pianist and composer.[354] Jazz has played an important role in Eastwood's life from a young age and, although he never made it as a professional musician, he passed on the influence to his son Kyle Eastwood, a successful jazz bassist and composer. Eastwood developed as a boogie-woogie pianist early on and had originally intended to pursue a career in music by studying for a music theory degree after graduating from high school. In late 1959 he produced the album Cowboy Favorites, released on the Cameo label.[354]

Eastwood has his own Warner Bros. Records-distributed imprint Malpaso Records, as part of his deal with Warner Brothers, which has released all of the scores of Eastwood's films from The Bridges of Madison County onward. Eastwood co-wrote "Why Should I Care" with Linda Thompson and Carole Bayer Sager, which was recorded by Diana Krall.[355]

Eastwood has contributed to over 50 films over his career as actor, director, producer, and composer. He has acted in several television series, including his starring role in Rawhide. He started directing in 1971, and made his debut as a producer in 1982, with Firefox, though he had been functioning as uncredited producer on all of his Malpaso Company films since Hang 'Em High in 1968. Eastwood also has contributed music to his films, either through performing, writing, or composing. He has mainly starred in western, action, and drama films. According to the box office–revenue tracking website Box Office Mojo, films featuring Eastwood have grossed a total of more than $1.68 billion domestically, with an average of $37 million per film.[367]

^University of Southern California. Division of Cinema; American Film Institute; Center for Understanding Media (1972). Filmfacts. Division of Cinema of the University of Southern California. p. 423. Retrieved January 13, 2011.

^The Reeves children are not included in the count, for instance, at Helligar, Jeremy (January 13, 1997). "Passages". People. Retrieved March 25, 2014. News anchor Dina Ruiz, 31, more than made husband Clint Eastwood's day when she gave birth to the couple's first child, an 8-lb. 4-oz. girl named Morgan, on Dec. 12 in Los Angeles. This is the 66-year-old actor-director's fifth child....

Fitzgerald, Michael G.; Magers, Boyd (2002). Ladies of the Western: Interviews With Fifty-One More Actresses from the Silent Era to the Television Westerns of the 1950s and 1960s. Jefferson, N.C.: McFarland. ISBN0-7864-1140-6.